Film Studies
A Psychoanalysis of Yorgos Lanthimos’ film Dogtooth (2009)
Dogtooth (2009) is a film that continues to gain an intense reaction from its audience. Some may find it an uncomfortable watch and difficult to follow while others declare it an ode to arthouse cinema. Whatever the reaction, it is difficult to deny that Dogtooth engages our visual pleasure (Mulvey) as spectators for we are able to fulfil our ‘curious gaze’ through our observations of the family participating in a number of bizarre behaviours. One way that this can be observed is in how the parents discipline their near adult children when they are seen to be acting out of line or in any way that doesn’t conform to the strict ideology that they have forcefully implemented. The film takes place in the desolate countryside of Greece and follows the interactions of the family and the threat that the outside world has on the patriarchal familial structure. Sigmund Freud, Jacques Lacan and Laura Mulvey are three highly influential psychologists who had great impact on the formation of Psychoanalysis. Although, they all have differing views on how Psychoanalysis they also share some common ideas that can be discussed when applying Psychoanalysis to film. This essay will discuss how the theories of Freud, Lacan and Mulvey can be used to decipher a film’s meaning through analysis.
The film begins with a close up of a tape recorder which plays a recording of a female’s voice who presents new words and their meanings. What is unusual here is that the words and their meanings do not match up with the audience’s understanding. The voice defines the word sea as being a ‘leather chair with wooden armrests’ and highway as a ‘very strong wind’, both of which are significantly different to their correct definition. This is a strong statement to be made at the beginning of the film and establishes a sense of confusion and disorientation as the audience struggles to identify anything that can inform meaning in the mise-en-scene such as clothing, technology and location. Therefore, the film appears as though it takes place in a timeline of its own and perhaps also in a fictional location. Jacques Lacan’s philosophy of language discusses how individuals create an understanding of language in conforming to the patriarchal familial figure (father). An individual who is unable to build an understanding of language is ultimately viewed as suffering from psychosis or another form of mental disorder. This is interesting because if we apply this theory to the tape recording played at the beginning of the film, we could argue that the children are in fact able to develop language accordingly because they are submissive to the commands of the father and ’to learn a language is to learn a set of rules for the use and combination of words’ which again refers back to how the words on the tape are listed almost like a set of rules to be abided by.
Lacan’s also discusses the unconscious and its role in developing language by controlling the ‘bodily manifestations and identifications with others and “external” objects that insist beyond his/her conscious control.’ This can be used to support the argument that the language that the children are taught by their parents is not entirely responsible for their understanding of the world around them and it is actually factors such as their repressed unconscious desires that rule how they identify and interact with others. Therefore, the subject of whether or not the children being brainwashed by the parents has a great impact on their development seems insignificant in comparison to the role of the unconscious because these desires are more powerful than anything that can be taught.
Within the same beginning scene, we are introduced to the three children, all of which are in the bathroom listening to the tape recording. The three mid shots (each lasting around thirty seconds to a minute) introduce each sibling separately so that the viewer is able to take in each character as an individual before seeing them as more or less versions of the same person as the extreme rules set by the parents leave little room for individuality. The mid shot of the eldest sibling is particularly significant because she is sitting facing away from the mirror which is directly behind her. This could be representative of the fact that she has yet to make the connection between her ‘inner self’ and ‘outer self’ as Lacan notes in a stage of development known as the mirror stage. Lacan estimated that the mirror stage takes place between the ages 6 - 18 months in infancy therefore this insinuates that the eldest sibling has skipped this stage of development as she is more like the age of an adult than a child. This could however explain the reasoning behind her childlike innocence and behaviour in the film as the children are often seen playing games and competing against each other to win prizes such as choice of the evenings activities, a choice which as an adolescent/adult you should be able to make for yourself which again reinforces the dominance of the patriarchal power structure.
Throughout the narrative, both the mother and father go to extremes to maintain the oppression of their children through lies and manipulation. They are indoctrinated with false stories of man eating cats and a brother that lives beyond the walls as another means of reinforcing the danger that lies in the outside world. The tale of the ‘dogtooth’ is perhaps the most symbolic as it signifies the key to their freedom and escape from oppression. Only when their ‘dogtooth’ falls out are they ready to leave the family home and face the outside world though this of course will not happen and the sense of hope and motivation that it gives the children to continue competing against one and other is entirely false.
By the end of the film, the eldest sibling comes full circle as she is finally able to identify with her ‘inner self’ which she develops from exposure to the outside world in the form of videotapes of Rocky, Jaws and Flashdance which she bargains with a security guard who visits the home for. Her unconscious desire to lose her ‘dogtooth’ becomes her ‘ideal self’ and her curiosity brings this desire to life. In an uncomfortably brutal scene she begins to mutilate her mouth with a barbell in an attempt to break her dogtooth. An over the shoulder shot allows the viewer to observe her looking in to the mirror at herself, pausing to smile and expose her teeth as she begins to hit her mouth the barbell. While this is happening she continues to pause in between to smile at her reflection almost as though she is gaining some form of pleasure from her liberation. In Lacan’s mirror theory infants are able to look at themselves in the mirror and recognise themselves and similarly in this scene the eldest sibling is recognising the implications of her ‘inner self’ on her ‘outer self’ and how she can make the two come together to form her own identity. Although she is successful in losing her ‘dogtooth’, it isn’t entirely clear whether she is successful in her venture in to the outside world as rather than running away she gets in to the boot of the father’s car and we never see her again though it can be inferred that the indoctrination of her parents is too extreme to allow her to function in the outside world due to the huge differences in language and behaviour that is socially constructed. Lacan believes that we can never match up to our ‘ideal self’ because we will always want more and this seems to be true of Dogtooth also.
The mise en scene is a visual representation of the patriarchal familial structure as it appears minimalistic, clean and orderly. Almost every shot appears very neutral, whites and blues and greys make the films colour palette which amplifies the cold, emotionless tone of the narrative. The only scenes which appear more colourful are those which take place outside which could be symbolic of the sense of freedom that outside has.
Another theme which can be applied to psychoanalytic film theory is sexuality which is most evident in the scenes which take place between the security guard and the son. The father pays a security guard at his workplace to have sex with his eldest son in order to control his sexual urges. The interactions between the son and security guard are completely devoid of emotion, there is no love involved just sex and it appears extremely unnatural and awkward. It could be argued that even in these moments the patriarchal order of the family is reinforced because the son does not care for the pleasure of the security guard and is only focused on his own selfish desires. In scenes of nudity there are often shots of individuals from the waist down which places an emphasis on the visual pleasure for the spectator. Laura Mulvey’s ‘Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema’ suggests that the cinema acts as a ‘safe space’ for spectators to indulge in their voyeuristic behaviour because no-one is watching them take pleasure in admiring the human form which would otherwise be frowned upon in day to day life. This creates a sense of ‘separation’ between the audience and the film and allows them to be active spectators and engage in scopophilic tendencies. Mulvey’s theory can be applied to the intimate scenes in Dogtooth because it projects ‘women as image and man as bearer of the look’ by hovering over the female form to allow the viewer to become voyeuristic by exposing them to the erotic contours of the body. The cinematic gaze is most often produced by masculine means and therefore this reinforces the idea that women's bodies are an object of masculine desire.
Bibliography:
(1) Dogtooth (2009)
https://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/dogtooth-2010
(3) A dive into the twisted psychology of Dogtooth (11th March 2018) (online) available from: http://thebigpicturemagazine.com/a-dive-into-the-twisted-psychology-of-dogtooth/ (online)
(4) Dogtooth and the Tyranny of the Paternal Metaphor (2012) (online) available from: http://film-philosophy.com/conference/index.php/conf/2012/paper/viewPaper/212
(4) Dogtooth (22nd April 2010) (online) available from: https://www.theguardian.com/film/2010/apr/22/dogtooth-review
(5) Film Review: Dogtooth (22nd April 2010) (online) available from: https://www.scotsman.com/lifestyle/film-review-dogtooth-1-800939
(6) Decoding 'The Killing of a Sacred Deer,' the Craziest Tragedy of 2017 (28th November 2017 (online) available from: https://www.vice.com/en_uk/article/vb354d/decoding-the-killing-of-a-sacred-deer-the-craziest-tragedy-of-2017 (online)
(8) The Favourite review: Yorgos Lanthimos courts controversy but cops out (7th January 2019) (online) available from: https://www.bfi.org.uk/news-opinion/sight-sound-magazine/reviews-recommendations/the-favourite-yorgos-lanthimos-olivia-colman-emma-stone-rachel-weisz (online)
(9) Freud's Stages of Psychosexual Development (online) available from: https://psychologenie.com/freuds-stages-of-development
(10) Oedipus complex: One of Freud's Most Controversial Ideas (20th September 2018) (online) available from: https://www.verywellmind.com/what-is-an-oedipal-complex-2795403
(11) The Oedipus Complex (online) available from: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iH_PRnY7Jkw
(12) Yorgos Lanthimos interview (9th December 2018) (online) available from: https://www.theguardian.com/film/2018/dec/09/yorgos-lanthimos-the-favourite-interview
(13) Dogtooth Film Review (25th April 2010) (online) available from: https://www.theguardian.com/film/2010/apr/25/dogtooth-film-review
(14) Lacan, Jacques Internet Encyclopaedia of Philosophy (online) available from: https://www.iep.utm.edu/lacweb/#H3
(15) Laura Mulvey (1999) Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema, Film Theory and Criticism, III Women as the image, men as the barer of the look, New York, Oxford UP, Page 840
(15) Laura Mulvey (1999) Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema, Film Theory and Criticism, III Women as the image, men as the barer of the look, New York, Oxford UP, Page 840
(15) Lanthimos's 'Dogtooth,' a Family Parable (24th June 2010) (online) available from: https://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/27/movies/27dogtooth.html
(16) Jacques Lacan Stanford Encyclopaedia of Philosophy (2nd April 2013) (online) available from: https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/lacan/
(17) symbolic, real, imaginary (2002) (online) available from: http://csmt.uchicago.edu/glossary2004/symbolicrealimaginary.htm
(16) Jacques Lacan Stanford Encyclopaedia of Philosophy (2nd April 2013) (online) available from: https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/lacan/
(17) symbolic, real, imaginary (2002) (online) available from: http://csmt.uchicago.edu/glossary2004/symbolicrealimaginary.htm
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